Phone call one after another and another...

...and more calls as we are travelling with kids. When there was only two of us, the car was our second home, but now I really have to be careful in choosing the hotel.

Today, I made a call to TM Directory to ask for a hotel phone number. What a shock to know, the hotel that appears first on the Google search for Perlis hotel is not in the listing. After digging more, I found it in a brochure of a conference that was held there last year.

I saw it has baby-sitting service and thought we might want to try it out.

After being passed around a few times, I finally received the rate of the room. Then, I asked for that baby-sitting service, and after another round I finally was attended but she asked me "Baby-sitting tu macam baby-cot ka?" Argggg!

"Noooooo...baby-cot tu katil baby. I mau babysitters!" I knew I was going nowhere but immediately my call was transfered again to someone else. She said they had stopped the service but it will resume in Nov.

"Will that be on the 7th (the day we will check in)?" I tested with a laugh as I was pretty sure it was not going to happen.

"I pass you to the duty manager" I started to get really dissapointed and irritated but I was still laughing in my heart, and that really helped.

Anyway, what followed was a lot better. The manager said they were contemplating to resume the service on the 1st but will get back to me once it is confirmed. She even calls it the "Kid's Club"...that sounds better to me.

And the reason for the baby-sitting is because hubby wants to go into some caves with me. I can be with the kids, confined in a hotel room all day while he is at work...but not him! Think I will let him pay...hehe!

More travellings on the go

A quick one while waiting for the iron to heat.

We are now in Batu Pahat to accompany hubby. Only for one night and I'm happy all of us are here. As far as my kids are concerned, there are 3 homes: rumah baru (referring to our new apartment), rumah lama (old apartment, now a giant storage space;)) and rumah hotel (I'm sure you know what this means). Whenever rumah hotel is mentioned for our incoming trips, the elder girls would ask, what type of rumah hotel, does it come with a beach, a lot of trees etc.

Here in Batu Pahat, we got no choice but to settle for a rather cheap one as all the others are fully booked. However, the were just busy inspecting and playing last night, and nw they are still in bed. And I contiued to work till 2 am.

BP appears to be a lot more different than 6-7 years ago. A lot more bussines I see. And can't really beleive it had been hit by the flood. We had Mee Racun Gearbox last night, only to be found here according to our hosts. Almost like mee hailam but with the additional "gearbox" element in there;). Sorry no pics as I was too lazy, besides the connection is a bit slow.

For Deepavali break, we will be heading to Perlis for some fieldtrip to the limestone park. There has been changes all the time. I should be in Langkawi for 2 conferences after that, and thought my crazy plan to do day-trip everyday changes a bit as hubby also needs to be there. The current plan is we drive to Perlis and stay for a few days, move to Langkawi on Saturday, do a bit of holidaying for me and kids as he works on Sunday. I will do the conference on Monday and we will return to KL in the afternoon after my presentation. Then the rest will follow my original idea.

We will stay in rumah hotel with a beach, Mutiara Burau Bay in Langkawi but I have yet to find one in Perlis.

Gotto go! Write more later.

Up I go

Post-raya entry is still in the draft *sigh*, here's a quick one!

On Tuesday and Wednesday, I went up a ridge (you may know where it is), it was cloudy and there was some drizzle but I came down refreshed and rejuvenated after piling up on the ketupat and cookies. Though the pics are not that good, I'm posting them here anyway :

This is the view at my back

this on my left (to the east)

this in front of me

this on my right (to the west), see the peak far away, we hope to concour that one day. We don't know if it is possible, though.

There will be more trips up there in the next few months. It is actually for work, and hopefully something good will come out from our studies. I'm looking forward to my next trip, which is next week. I just love being up there, it is a good way to get away from the office routine.

Anyway, though the views are just breathtaking, I still had the first sight I see every morning, my sleeping baby all the time.

This one is for KittyCat, as she said she loves looking at baby sleeping with both arms up. That's how my Adel sleeps;)

Tag: Let's recycle our first post

A quick entry before hitting the sack.

5xmomtagged on looking back to the first entry. One of the things that makes me wanted to quit is my first post. I always remember it with a little embarrasement and yet I never took it out.

Well a bit of history first. I only knew blogging from a few moms in MMB and of course 5xmom herself. It never really occured to me that a blogger can write just about anything under the sun, and beyond that. Well, I was inclined to write about my kids, and of course writing about our lives seemed unavoidable. After a while, it was kind of a routine, it became a personal diary pulak. Thought of writing about totally different thing but I thought I would start another blog for that.

I wrote my first entry months before I first hit the "publish" button, as I was not really sure if I was really into this. It was a long and boring one "yawn". It is a like my one-sided conversation with hubby. Looking back, I thought how come I start like that.
It was about some sleepless nights I had, some nightmares that later I believed were early symptoms of pregnancy. Only after finding out that I was really pregnant with my Bea3, I had the courage to really do this, plus some nudges from some bloggers but I had already settled with "mama22beas" and still can't find the right name till now;).

Here's the final sentences of the first entry.

"All this kind of dreams (and comes one after another) only mean one thing to me...it could be some indications of some hormonal change. With all other changes that I was having, I had the courage to do a pregnancy test. And yes, I'm now expecting my 3rd baby. By the time I finished writing this, I'm in my 12th week. I was thinking to change my username (as now no longer mama to only 2 beas) but still no idea. I'm happy if I finally can submit this as my first entry (I've commented other people blogs and they asked me why my link is not working...ya la, I've not activated it), and worry about the name later. I love to put links of the blogs that I'm enjoying but do not know how...I will slowly learn."

...and I'm ashamed to admit that I hardly learn anything new in the past 21/2 years.

You can read the whole thing herebut I've warned about that one-sided conversation, ok!

Ok, I'd love to know what another mom,bluewonder says about her first post.

Gearing up for working (and blogging) at home

I'd been avoiding bringing work home but now career or work (I still can't call what I do now a career) wise, think I'm the busiest and working at home now seems inevitable. So, finally yesterday we got this:

A bit nervous though they say or area has good HSDPA, whatever that stands for, but to me its the coverage la kot;). tried it last night, only got two bar. Later 3 towards the midnight. After sahur, 5 and now at almost 8 am, 3 again. Though they give us one-week cooling-off period, the RM100 for activation is non-refundable. Think, this is the first time I ever get technical in my blog...hehe!

Now, I really need a working table. Plus we have not really decided on the dining table yet, the only table we bought is the Mamut. I remember hubby and the girls were waiting for me to finish nursing Adel at the warehouse with the table already in the cart. The girls eargerly waited for my nod of agreement for them to add tiny little stools to complete the set. Love looking all of them running to the shelf to get one of those each (I'm sorry for my English, not enough sleep, can't think properly already!), they're cute. And yes, we've been eating and working on it too.

And I also want to finalise what I want for the yard, I'm changing the kitchen sink with a new one, and bring the old one to the yard. With this lot to do, looks like a trip to Ikea is inevitable *sigh*!

Better get prepared before the girls get up, they must be hungry...cioa! See you soon.

I do it the hard way

Intro: I will participate in two conferences in Langkawi in Nov. I was 'forced' to present something in the first one, a national conference, while the second is an international one. Earlier I thought I would only take either one, but after weighing pros and cons, I decided to attend both. They are back-to-back. The first one takes one day, the other three days: 2 days of lectures and one day fieldtrip (that I can let go) in between. Earlier, we plan to make it a family trip, a holiday for hubby and the kids. But later I found out, we may need to make another trip just days earlier, later hubby found out he just couldn't take leave days from his work. End of intro

Now, the challenge is how do I it without having separated from the kids during the nights. Earlier I thought, hubby could drive us there, return to KL by flight, I take the hotel babysitting services and hubby fly again to fetch us. After a lot of thinking, that would cost us a bomb, plus I have no experience with hotel babysitting. Then, last night while getting Adel to sleep, I just had an idea and ran to hubby who was napping, snuggled up close to him and here's the conversation:

Me: Abe, I just got an idea!
Him: Huh?

Me: I take the first MAS flight for the first conference and return in the evening

Him:*silence*

Me: Abe, listen la...the next day, I again take the first MAS flight again...I will check if I have the allocation for all the trips, I will book a return flight throught the uni for the conference. But I will also get a return Langkawi-KL ticket from Airasia with my money. So, I will fly back with Airasia, take a day off, and fly back to Langkawi, early morning the next day and return to KL in the evening. I just pray Airasia won't be delayed. And I pray morning sessions will be, instead. Ok or not?

*I thought he was not listening but....*

Him: You can't do that (that is crazy, woman!)

Me: Yes, I can...sure I can

Him: No, no...

Me: Yes, yes....

And today, after a few calls...I'm pretty sure it can be done. The only thing now is to stock up more on expressed milk...if you are here, you can see me smiling ear to ear!

Will do anything to have this guy close to me esp. at nights!

The first separations

Sunshines peeked through the curtains in the bedroom, it was an off day and everybody was still asleep. I thought I should continue enjoying more time in the dreamland but the sight of my sleeping baby just kept me awake. I grabbed the camera.

Then he stirred and opened his eyes, and later we were joined by Bea3 and I thought, there goes another chance to catch up on sleep and more sleep.

This kind of morning made me think and wonder on how I would feel about separating from them again, especially Adel Rayyan when I got back to work. I prepared for it anyway!

Thought of taking more leave days, in a way to postpone the separation but someone reminded me that I have classes. Not much, 2 classes, 2 hours each and calls and calls kept coming and I finally decided that was it..."I'm coming back (to real work)".

It was not as bad as I thought. The first time was last week, I had a meeting about 20 km away and it would take me about 4 hours. I prepared expressed milk enough to feed him for the whole day. I walked out of the babysitter's, and as usual prayed that everything would be fine.

I called about an hour after that, he was still sleeping. Another call after another hour, he finished 3 oz milk and my boy was a bit fussy when trying to go back to sleep, after that he was all ok.

So far, I only do it for a few hours each. Today is the fifth time, he would follow me to the office sometimes after that, or we just go back. For yesterday (and today), most probably he would accompany me to the mall for what else ...raya shopping. He is a great shopping companion, so far.

I took some pics this morning, both Bea3 and him were just in a happy mood, while the bigger sisters were still a bit sleepy at the back!

There another I-should-not-be-blogging entry, but I do it anyway just to show off my baby...again, hehe!